Literary Birthday – 23 October – Naomi Alderman

Naomi Alderman Quotes

My aim is that mornings are for books and afternoons are for games. I write 100 words before getting out of bed and 800 words a day, which takes me to about lunchtime, unless it’s a really bad day.

If I’m working every day it’s like pumping a pump. When you start, rusty water comes out and then it runs clear. I do it even if I get completely stuck.

I went into the novel religious and by the end I wasn’t. I wrote myself out of it.

It doesn’t matter that she shouldn’t, that she never would. What matters is that she could, if she wanted. The power to hurt is a kind of wealth.

This is the trouble with history. You can’t see what’s not there. You can look at an empty space and see that something’s missing, but there’s no way to know what it was.

What is freedom, in the end, but that no one cares any longer to try to restrain us?

The only wave that changes anything is a tsunami. You have to tear down the houses and destroy that land if you want to be sure no one will forget you.

Those who live narrow lives have only themselves to blame when they find themselves shocked.

Naomi Alderman is an English author, novelist and game designer. She is the author of The Power and Disobedience. The Power was the winner of the 2017 Baileys’ Women’s Prize for Fiction and has been translated into more than 30 languages. Follow her on Twitter: @NaomiAllthenews